In the field of education, experiments in optics are essential for students to understand physical phenomena such as spectroscopy, interferometry, laser beam propagation . . . . However, mounting an optical bench requires many high tech optical, opto-mechanical and opto-electronic components. Optical components such as lenses or mirrors are generally fragile and require a rather clean environment. An optical bench is thus expensive and time consuming for both construction and maintenance. Moreover, experiments in optics are potentially hazardous due to the use of laser light sources.
In the field of manufacturing complex optical or opto-electronics systems such as lasers or microscopes, training production-line operators is necessary to achieve careful alignment of the optical, opto-mechanical and opto-electronic components. Moreover, due to rapid evolution in these high tech products, new adjustment methods are also required in the manufacturing environment. Because ready-made optical benches for teaching specific optical or opto-electronic systems are not available, a production system is usually taken from production line for the duration necessary to training. This immobilization is expensive and returning a system to the production line requires additional readjustments.
An alternative to physical optical benches or real optoelectronic systems is to run purely numerical models instead of real life experiments. Many software applications are now available for design and simulation of numerous optical or illumination systems. These numerical models are capable of simulating geometrical optics, imaging systems, coherent laser and fiber optic systems. However, these simulations rely on ideal numerical models and, consequently, the simulated result can be far from reality. Moreover, these numerical models are also complex to use and do not provide the same sensorial interactions to students or operators as compared to a real life optical bench.
In the publication “Illuminating light: an optical design tool with a luminous-tangible interface”, Proc. CHI '98, ACM Press. p 542-549, 1998, J. Underkoffler and H. Ishii describe a mock holographic recording setup comprising plastic objects representing optical components, a camera for tracking position of the plastic objects and a projector for projecting a simulated optical beam path. The planar simulated beam path is updated depending on inputs from the camera. However, this system does not reproduce a true optical setup.